The Opera Tattler

Reviews of Performances and their Audiences

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Category: Concert Review

  • Leila Josefowicz at SFS

    * Notes * James Gaffigan is conducting San Francisco Symphony in a program of Haydn, Thomas Adès, and Mozart this week. Gaffigan is a tiny sprite of a person, brimming with energy from the beginning in the Allegro assai con brio of Haydn's Symphony No. 52 in C minor. The woodwinds sounded slightly squeaky in their entrance for…

  • ERSO at Cal Performances

    * Notes * The Estonian National Symphony Orchestra performed in Berkeley yesterday afternoon as the final concert in a tour of the United States. The rather large orchestra, conducted by Eri Klas, displayed a fine control during Pärt's Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten. Likewise, the quiet parts of Sibelius' Symphony No. 2 in D major were played…

  • The Tallis Scholars sing Mouton, Praetorius, & Lassus

    * Notes * The Tallis Scholars performed an incredible concert at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley an last night. Lead by Peter Phillips, the 10 singers produced a pure but almost palpable sound. Their volume was strong, though it helps that the venue has such good acoustics. The program featured composers of the Renaissance polyphony,…

  • PBO’s Wind and Waves

    * Notes * Philharmonia Baroque gave an excellent concert last night in San Francisco. Their sound tends toward the clean and fastidious. The evening began with Francesco Maria Veracini's light, elegant Overture No. 6 in G minor followed by the jaunty Concerto a più instrumenti, Op. 5, No. 3 from Evaristo Felice Dall'Abaco. Vivaldi's Concerto in…

  • Ashkenazy conducts SFS

    * Notes * Last night Vladimir Ashkenazy conducted San Francisco Symphony in the world premiere of Steven Gerber's Music in Dark Times. The piece was commissioned by Ashkenazy and also dedicated to him.The fanfares of the first and last movements did not show off the brass to their best advantage, though the woodwinds sounded beautiful in the second movement.…

  • San Francisco Piano Quartet

    * Notes * The San Francisco Piano Quartet played this afternoon as part of Noe Valley Chamber Music's 16th season. The performance began with three movements of Antonín Dvořák's Piano Quartet in E flat Major, then involved various bits and pieces of music from related composers, and finally ended with the last movement from the first…

  • Luisotti conducts SFS

    * Notes * This week the incoming music director of San Francisco Opera, Nicola Luisotti, is conducting San Francisco Symphony in a program of Kodály, Bloch, and Brahms. The Galántai Tánkoc (Dances of Galánta) from Kodály were great fun. The woodwinds sounded clear, the clarinet and oboe were particularly lovely. In the second piece, cellist Michael Grebanier…

  • Bach: Favorite Cantatas

    * Notes * The American Bach Soloists performed four Bach cantatas yesterday evening in San Francisco. The concert began with a bit of a rehearsal for the audience, as we were to sing the final chorales for Cantatas 140, 78, and 80. When the actual soloists started singing Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, they…

  • James Conlon at SFS

    * Notes * James Conlon conducted San Francisco Symphony in a performance of Berlioz, Liszt, and Shostakovich yesterday evening. The horn timing seemed somewhat off in Berlioz's Le Corsaire Overture, though I do not know the piece, so certainly I cannot say this definitively. The flutes played very deftly, and the brass did sound quite…

  • Martha Argerich at SFS

    * Notes * San Francisco Symphony gave a concert of Gabrieli, Ligeti, Ravel, and Liszt last Friday. In ecclesiis from Gabrieli's Symphoniae sacrae was lead by chorus director Ragnar Bohlin. The piece sounded both clear and lovely. Michael Tilson Thomas took over for Ligeti's Requiem, an eerie work in which both wails and hives could…